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The Final Decade of the Original Blue Note
}} Quality Productions Don't Slow Down Blue Note's Downward Spiral }} : The consolidation of the record business in the 1960s through the 1970s, the explosion of Rock, Folk, Rhythm and Blues, and Soul music in the mid-1960s began to dry up not only performance spaces but pools of performers, as many musical artists went in search of other more profitable or more interesting genres. Many followed the money and fame and opportunity. Jazz acts signed exclusive deals for bigger money, and sought out labels that could insure them solid air play on the dwindling number of Jazz radio stations. This was not the fertile creative ground that gave birth to BeBop and Blue Note, but Wolff and a new producing duo had their share of successes in the 1970s at Blue Note Liberty Records Acquires Blue Note : Liberty Records made Lion an offer to buy the label in 1965. Lion and Wolff grabbed it. Both stayed on, but, by 1967, health problems forced Lion to retire. Wolff and Duke Pearson divided up the producing for Blue Note. : Frank Wolff died in 1971. Pearson brought in the Mizell Brothers, a duo of Howard University educated men who came to Blue Note to establish themselves as producers in their own right. The Mizell Brothers Take Blue Note Sky High : Larry Mizell had little entertainment experience but Alphonzo "Fonce" Mizell was a member of The Corporation the hit-making machine writing and producing for the Jackson 5 that consisted of Motown founder Berry Gordy, writer-producers Deke Richards, who brought Fonce to The Company, and Freddie Perren, a childhood friend, bandmate and classmate of the Mizells, both in high school and at Howard. Perren would also work for Sky High Productions at Blue Note. : Together they produced fusion jazz albums for Blue Note as Sky High Productions. They produced Donald Byrd's Black Byrd in 1972 which was a big hit for the label and set the tone for Blue Note records of the 1970s. : They went on to team up with Byrd for his albums Street Lady (1973), Stepping into Tomorrow (1974), Places and Spaces (1975) and Caricatures (1976) : Sky High produced Bobbi Humphrey's Blacks and Blues (1973), Satin Doll (1974) and Fancy Dancer (1975). Humphrey was brought to the label by Lee Morgan. They also produced Johnny "Hammond" Smith's Gambler's Life (1974) and Gears (1975) for Blue Note. The Last Blue Note Artist : The last active Blue Note artist was Horace Silver, who recorded for the label from 1952 until 1980. Liberty was swallowed up in a merger with United Artists Records, which in turn came under control of Capitol Records, which in turn was acquired by EMI Records. : For a time, the Blue Note label survived through a program of reissues and previously unreleased material that then Blue Note executive Charlie Lourie and Michael Cuscuna started in 1975. That program survived sporadically until 1981. : When EMI took over Capitol, it was a matter of time before the small Blue Note label, that was not putting out enough popular music or enough cutting-edge artists, was shut down. }}